Friday, July 18, 2014

Closing Comments

When I first started writing about the lacrosse case, at a
joint historians’ blog called Cliopatria, I did so in reaction to the Group of 88 statement. Then (and now) I considered the statement an indefensible
betrayal by professors of their own school’s students, an action that
contradicted many of the basic values on which American higher education rests.

Absent the Group statement, I doubt I would have noticed the
case at all—in spring 2006, I didn’t even know that Duke had a lacrosse team,
much less know any of its members. But as I remained interested in the case, the
editor of Cliopatria suggested I spin off into a focused blog. When I did so,
in August 2006, I envisioned a six-week effort, which would perhaps provide
background for people interested in the case from the 60 Minutes broadcast, which I had heard was scheduled for early
October. Instead, a flurry of events—the delay of the broadcast, then the
November 2006 election, the Meehan hearing, the Nifong ethics charges, the
culmination of the criminal case, and the two Nifong hearings—sustained the
blog on a daily basis (the blog had more than 1000 posts during its first 14
months) through September 2007.

I stopped daily posts in fall 2007, and since then have averaged
only about a post a week. I extended the blog to follow the civil cases, which
struck me as likely to establish important precedents. (They did so, though in
ways that trouble me—suggesting that in the 4th Circuit colleges
have no obligation to enforce the student bulletin or faculty handbook, at least in cases where disfavored groups of students are targeted by powerful faculty interests on campus; and victims
have no grounds for a federal civil rights lawsuit when prosecutors and police conspire to frame innocent
people, provided the police are internally candid about their lack of evidence
and the prosecutor obtains a grand jury indictment.) The civil cases dragged on
for much longer than I had anticipated, largely due to Durham’s high-risk, but ultimately
high-reward, strategy of filing multiple interlocutory appeals to avoid any
discovery.

This delay, ironically, meant that the blog remained active
during two unanticipated but important events.

The first came when Duke employed the civil suit discovery
process to try and obtainmy private correspondence with confidential sources for the book and blog. For
reasons neither the university nor its attorneys ever explained, I was the only
person who covered the case to receive such a subpoena; even UPI co-author Stuart Taylor wasn’t
targeted by Duke. Thanks to excellent representation from my attorney, Patrick
Strawbridge, and assistance from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the
Press, I resisted the subpoena. A limited setback before a Maine magistrate
judge evaporated in the courtroom of Maine district court judge Brock Hornby,
who peppered the Duke attorneys with questions, eliciting the extraordinary
statement that Duke would be happy for its professors to live under the same
standards the university expected of me. (Unsurprisingly, no member of the
Brodhead administration ever informed Duke faculty members of this new policy,
which would decimate the freedom to research controversial topics at Duke.) In
the aftermath of the hearing, and after the Carrington
settlement, Duke withdrew its subpoena before Hornby could render a
decision. The magistrate judge’s decision subsequently was vacated.

The second significant event occurred with publication of
the revisionist
book by William D. Cohan. In his up-is-down opus, Cohan portrayed Mike
Nifong as victim, “crucified” by the efforts of an amorphous conspiracy that
included defense attorneys, the State Bar, some members of the media, Judge Osmond Smith, the
Disciplinary Hearing Commission, families of the lacrosse players, senior
prosecutors in the North Carolina attorney general’s office, and Northeastern lawyers whose identities he declined to reveal. Cohan reached this startling conclusion not by
interviewing any members of the alleged conspiracy, but instead by speaking to
Nifong at length, and then uncritically accepting the version of events offered
by his chief source, a convicted liar. The result: a book praised by many of
the papers who got the story wrong at the start, and sharply
criticized by virtually every reviewer who knew anything about what occurred in
Durham.

Before doing so, however, allow me to offer three general
reflections:

The Academy

Higher education is perhaps the only product in which
Americans spend tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars without having
any clear sense of what they are purchasing. Few parents, alumni, legislators,
or prospective students spend much (if any) time exploring the scholarship or
syllabi offered by professors at the school of their choice; they devote even less
effort to understanding hiring patterns or pedagogical changes that have driven
the contemporary academy to an ideological extreme on issues of race, class,
and gender. At most, there seems to be a general—incorrect—impression that
while colleges have the occasional “tenured radical” who lacks real influence
on campus, most professors fall well within the ideological mainstream.

But while most outsiders have neither the time nor the
inclination to challenge faculty on scholarly or curricular matters, the
lacrosse case was different. Here, the relevant facts were public knowledge.
The event was high-profile, and the more evidence that emerged, the less likely
it appeared that a crime occurred. At the least, it was clear by 1 May 2006 that
at least one innocent Duke student (Reade Seligmann) had been indicted.

And yet for dozens of Duke faculty, this evidence appeared
irrelevant. Eighty-eight of them rushed to judgment, signing a statement (whose
production violated Duke regulations in multiple ways) affirming that something
had “happened” to false accuser Crystal Mangum, and thanking protesters (“for
not waiting”) who had, among other things, urged the castration of the lacrosse captains and blanketed the campus with “wanted” posters. As the case to which
they attached their public reputations imploded, Group members doubled down,
with most issuing a second statement promising they would never apologize for
their actions. (Only three Group members ever said they were sorry for signing the
statement, and two of that number subsequently retracted those apologies.) For months,
the Duke administration was either in agreement with the faculty extremists or
cowed by them—or some combination of both.

In this respect, Duke isn’t exceptional: if the
lacrosse case had occurred at another elite university, something like the
Group of 88 probably would have formed there, as well. (Hypothetical Groups at
other schools might not have been quite as large—the effects of ex-president
Keohane and ex-provost Chafe on maximizing race/class/gender hires did have
some additional effect.) Nifong, on the other hand, was unusual.

Prosecutorial misconduct is a blight on the American justice
system, but few prosecutors violate quite as many ethical rules in a single
case as did the disgraced former DA. Of course, Durham’s particular
circumstances accounted at least to some degree for the extent of Nifong’s
perfidy: he had to violate ethical guidelines to create “evidence” of a “crime”
that never occurred; and then he had to violate more ethical guidelines to
create “evidence” to point to the “perpetrators” of this non-existent crime.

It’s worth remembering, however: lots of people seemed quite
untroubled with Nifong’s actions. He did, after all, win the primary election—the
day after Durham voters saw on their TV screens a video of Reade Seligmann at an ATM
machine at the time Nifong claimed a rape was occurring. And he did win the general
election—even after Durham voters were exposed to massive evidence of his
ethical improprieties, thanks to reporting from the N&O and 60 Minutes. Moreover,
Nifong almost managed to bring the case to trial. The State Bar vote to go
ahead with the prosecution before the end of the case passed only by one vote,
with the chair of the relevant committee casting the tie-breaking ballot. If
not for the brilliant cross-examination from Jim Cooney and Brad Bannon, plus
the inability of Dr. Brian Meehan to carry off the conspiracy, would the Bar
have acted when it did?

Despite his apologists’ best efforts to rehabilitate his
reputation, Nifong’s behavior might have had one salutary effect: he now
personifies the position of rogue prosecutor. Journalists, legal commentators,
and the public at large now have a reference point when they hear defense
attorneys speak of the importance of due process, or caution against
prosecutors violating ethical norms. And DA’s inclined to ignore ethics to
advance their political careers will (hopefully, at least) recall Nifong’s
fate.

Media

Excellent coverage of this case came from some quarters of the traditional
media—from the 2006-2008 staff of the Duke Chronicle;
from Joe Neff at the N&O; and
nationally from 60 Minutes and ABC’s
Law and Justice Unit. But the terrible traditional coverage—from the New York Times, the Herald-Sun, op-ed commentators such as Selena Roberts and Eugene
Robinson, and other outlets in the early stages of the case—was terrible
indeed.

The bad work suffered from two problems that reinforced each other. The first comes from the media’s general ideological biases. While not
as left-wing as the typical elite school’s faculty, the media obviously leans
left, especially on issues of race and gender; and in spring 2006, the facts
offered by Nifong seemed for too many too good to be false. So rather than challenging
Nifong’s presentation of the case, the Times, the H-S, and politically
correct commentators and authors served as de facto
stenographers for the prosecutor, uncritically passing along whatever version
of events he happened to be offering at the time.

The second general problem exposed by the case was the media’s
poor coverage of procedure and procedural issues. It’s no coincidence that the
best reporter on this case—Neff—was comfortable with procedure, and that the
worst—Duff Wilson and self-described “serious investigative journalist” William D. Cohan—appeared clueless on procedural matters.

For the media as a whole, covering procedure can be
difficult—it’s often technical, and it doesn’t exactly sell newspapers. But as
the lacrosse case demonstrated, explaining the role of procedure in policy and
legal matters is a critical role that journalists play in society. And while
there’s been some progress in this regard (consider, for instance, the Washington Post partnering in its blogs with
Volokh
Conspiracy or Radley
Balko), as a whole, the media tends to do a poor job at illustrating
procedural matters. Jim
Fallows’ laments about the mainstream newspapers’ frequent failures to
explain the Senate’s filibuster process is a good example of the broader
problem.

-----------------

DIW was a blog of a particular time and place. If the
lacrosse case had occurred a few years earlier, the blog likely never could
have been launched. In the initial months, I relied heavily on primary source
material posted by others (the N&O and
WRAL for discovery documents; the State of North Carolina for various ethics
and election items; Duke and electronic resources for academic matters). As recently
as the late 1990s, this type of material often was not available online, so initially covering
the case from New York or Maine (as I did, most of the time) would not have
been possible

—meaning that I never would have developed the local sources whose willingness to answer questions from me (and not infrequently provide me with tips) helped the blog to break stories.

If the lacrosse case occurred today, on the other hand, the
blog’s reach almost certainly would have diminished; the blog’s biggest
readership days (over 100,000 each day) occurred during the live-blogs of the
Nifong ethics proceedings; most of that information would now be communicated
via twitter, not through live-blogs, which have become passé.

It might well be—as any number of commentators
have contended—that
blogs, at least of this type, will be much less common in the future. (I’ll
still be writing on higher-ed matters, at the Manhattan Institute’s Minding the Campus, and readers can follow me on twitter; obviously my academic work is still on my homepage.) That said, many
of the strengths of a blog—namely, the sense of community from readers and
commenters—aren’t easily replicable on twitter or in other forms. Moreover, the
structure of the blog certainly aided me; over the course of the case, I learned
a lot about criminal procedure, legal ethics, the nature of journalism, and North Carolina issues, courtesy of exchanges with readers, commenters, and other bloggers.

KC, you have been our hero. There is no way my family can ever repay you for the countless hours you have spent, exposing the truth of this travesty of justice. In our darkest days, you were our light. You gave us strength to continue in our fight and helped us understand that even though many of the Duke faculty did not care about the truth, justice or the innocence of our sons, there are individuals of character, kindness and courage in this crazy world we live in. You are a true example of selflessness. We are eternally grateful to you.

I have also learned,intellectually, the Duke faculty pale in comparison to you. You have taken them on as they have attacked us and you, and dissected their lies with truth and supporting evidence.

I consider it a honor to know you. You will forever hold a special place in my heart for the support you gave us during this most difficult time. It is a privilege to call you my friend.

I will miss your blog and the light it has shed upon so many injustices. You are an inspiration!!

"That said, many of the strengths of a blog—namely, the sense of community from readers and commenters—aren’t easily replicable on twitter or in other forms."

And yet, the marketing fraudsters and chattering class deem these things to be "social". They're the exact opposite, by design. Too many people communicating with each other on the internet, something had to be done.

In this time, in this place, in this case, you were a godsend. Those of us who followed events daily, literally hung on your every word, and, waited in the weeds to see where you would lead us. Let's not forget that you led this "campaign" from an open position anchored right in the enemy camp of academia.

That's courage.

The term..."hero"...is used too loosely these days for those who score the winning goal, or cross the finish line first. You literally saved lives. The designation rightly fits you.

None of us who followed this debacle, or cared immensely about this case, can imagine..."what might have been" without Durham in Wonderland and KC Johnson.

None of us who followed this debacle, or cared immensely about this case...can let this Blog close without saying....thank you.

Most of the time, the Nifongs of the world will eventually be caught, and one wishes it was earlier in the course of events so damage can be held to a minimum.

What worries me a lot are the Cohans of the world. This is NOT an attack on free press. I'm thinking along the lines of intelligent criticism of "revisionist history" accounts that don't even attempt to refute basic points that were previously established. I worry about the fawning reviews "The Price of Silence" received in some mainstream publications. Lastly, I worry about the seeming abdication of editors (and publishers) of their job. How did Cohan's book ever get out of the starting gate in its published form? Hello, Scribner.

Regarding this latest episode, I'm thankful to Johnson and Taylor, Dorothy Rabinowitz, Mark Wylie and numerous others on Amazon and other outlets. I am sad, however, that there weren't many more providing intelligent critique, even if they took a different view than mine.

Professor Johnson, thanks for this great blog. I do wish it could be kept in a "caretaker" status even if there were only a couple of posts a year.

High praise and lots of it, KC. If there's a better example of high-impact media criticism in the last ten years, I can't think of it. Your integrity and tenacity are a true inspiration. Here's hoping that even a small handful of your readers pay it forward by becoming citizen journalists and media critics themselves. Sadly, there's far too many cases of agenda-driven media attacks that could use the treatment.

I was a father of a men's soccer player at a different, much smaller university. So I viewed this blog with concern as to how much a university and surrounding community can do to an unsuspecting student's life on campus and future career prospects.

Again thanks for your contribution and I continue to follow your contributions in other venues.

The actions by many of the Duke faculty and administrators in this case continue to stick in my craw. Have these people no sense of decency, honor or shame? That President Brodhead remains on the job is disgusting.

I stopped sending them money a long time ago, and they'll never get another cent from me. Sometimes people who know I graduated from Duke ask me about sending their kids there. I always discourage them.

The only place to triangulate and find truth regarding the Duke Lacrosse matter was on your blog.

Thanks for your service.

I concur with the comments here, particularly those critical of Brod Dickhead and his absolute lack of concern for truth and justice. That he is employed as the leader of our University is truly a sad commentary on how far we've fallen from the days of Governor Sanford.

There were several true heroes in this matter. Some of them were paid (and hopefully paid well) to do the outstanding jobs they did. I am not detracting from those heroes for this reason, because one could still be paid and roll over without seeing justice done.

But you, professor, performed your work selflessly, without additional pay (I can't imagine your outstanding book was a real money maker, no matter how excellent it was), and with very noble goals. Kudos for that.

I hope you take some real satisfaction with you through life in knowing that your actions played a huge part (perhaps the largest part) in creating the circumstances that allowed our PC society to step back, see what was happening, and in turn saved these young men and their families from all the potential yet unknown horrible consequences of the prison system.

I've been dreading the day you would close the blog, but appreciate so much all the work you did. I am pleased, as you indicate in this comment, that you were still posting during the Cohen book tour, to hopefully put the last nail in the coffin of any attempts to resurrect Nifong's legacy. The case has been emotional throughout, and your goodbye is surprisingly emotional as well.

Thank you again for your tireless, selfless work and the sacrifices you no doubt endured while doing what was right in this matter.

As a Duke alum and big Blue Devil fan, I've been an avid reader of the blog and your other great work, including UPI. Thanks so much for all of that and I echo the other praises in these comments. It's with a combination of great pride and trepidation that I send my son to Duke as a freshman in the fall. You've helped to educate me on a few things to warn him about. Best regards.

Thank you KC for your valuable work over the past 8 years. You've provided a tremendous service. I will delete my bookmark for Durham-in-Wonderland and replace it with Minding the Campus.Don in New Orleans

It would be a fresh spark of hope to see the lacrosse players forgive whatever harms Ms. Mangum has caused against them in this political charade they were all forced into by Duke. This could be in the form of applying their available legal resources they seem more able to employ than many citizens of NC to assisting citizens of NC in standing against the corrupt justice system that is the Duke / Durham / NC justice when involved in cases against Duke and/or their affiliates and/or Duke agenda driven identities, as they themselves are just the tip of the iceberg of victims that are treated similar or worse as them by Duke, et. al.

It is hard to watch the Innocence Commission do it's current work in Durham while also watching crimes of the same degree of corrupt injustice committed by the current system that they do or say nothing supportive to stop. They could make a positive difference for ALL in NC for the better by helping to end the corruption that continues unabated in present day that affects all. Even when the corrupt injustice occurs in cases against Ms. Mangum, since there it may be more likely to see the harm and the threat that Duke's corruption poses to all more clearly. Many innocents will continue to pay their price for them otherwise, as often happens in history.

Thanks for letting me say that KC on your blog and for your wise consideration.

Stuart Taylor recently said in an interview that you were a "force of nature".

He pointed out you were able to author this amazing seven years' blog as an aside, in your spare time - while teaching your classes, teaching overseas, and researching and writing your professional work.

The quality of this blog has changed the way blogs are viewed as sources of relevant and reliable information. Have you noticed, for one example, how your blog is now accepted as an authoritative source on Wikipedia? This was not true in the early years.

You have also set the standard for those who attempt to follow you in the future: quality research; logical conclusions drawn from verifiable facts; and, all applied with high intelligence.

On a personal level, I wrote here years ago that you are one of the few people I know I would pay money to talk to over a cup of coffee. If I am ever up your way, I will try to bother you enough to say hello - coffee on me.

I wish we could persuade you to maintain this blog, with its reputation, in caretaker status (What will happen to the irreplaceable DIW archive??).

The issues you outline in your farewell message are still live. We all await the next Cohan, or Group of 88, or major media hysteria.

However, none of us has the right to ask you to do more than you have. Thank you very, very much.

"This could be in the form of applying their available legal resources they seem more able to employ than many"

They already carried the water for legal reform in NC; they sought to have a federal monitor for the DPD for ten years; mandatory taping of all police interrogations; a strict chain of command for the DPD; etc.

NO ONE in NC supported these requests.

NOT ONE law school, or rights group, has joined with the supporters of the lax team to ask for mandatory Grand Jury transcripts, an absolute right to a probable cause hearing for ALL accused persons, and a Speedy Trial law.

Evidently the ONLY ones fighting for these reforms were out of state players, who would never benefit themselves from such reforms.

Ask Irving Joyner and the NCCU law faculty, and the Duke law faculty, and the rights groups, why they have never supported such reforms.

Durham elected Nifong twice, and then Cline after him. If Durham really wants reform, it has to show that by its own actions. It has the power to overturn the present corrupt system; it just has to do so at the ballot box.

I've followed this case and your blog from the beginning and am still trying to digest the whole affair.

What bothers me the most is my conclusion that too many people seem to have increasing difficulty separating fact from opinion.

Those who are unwilling to do so occupy too many positions of power, authority, and influence. Those who are unable to do so are the products of an educational system that does not stress independent critical thinking.

As I type this Putin is blaming the murder of 298 people on the Ukrainian government; let's hope there are more people like you who are willing to separate fact from opinion and let the chips fall where they may.

It is not as simple as voting, since first there has to be someone to elect that is not corrupted. And then how do you expect that elected noncorrupt person to function in the corrupt system? Is it possible? Good question.

Reform is a four letter word in NC meaning whatever Duke and their croonies insist on changing to screw over the entire state and it's citizens (again).

NC needs lawyers willing and able to fight the corruption, even if it is a case by case battle - at least NC citizens and visitors would have a fighting chance. Right now the entire system is a joke, and 'they' are still laughing.

Several years ago I left a lecture by Li Lu who was one leader involved with the Tiananmen Square student protests. Mr. Lu had come close to liberating a quarter of the world's population. One person can indeed make a difference.

Thank you for this blog, Professor Johnson, and to all the excellent commenters who assisted over the years. I have rediscovered my appreciation and pride for my halcyon days as a player for the Duke Blue Devil lacrosse team.

When I first read of the false rape I though how could these students do that. I quickly realized, in no small part to you, this blog and UPI how wrong I was.

I also came to understand if a corrupt DA was confident he could get away with convicting students with resources and families who knew how to fight this injustice how many poor uninformed (mainly black) males were probably unjustly convicted over the years.

My family lives in Durham. My wife and I were in China adopting our eighth child when we read the first reports of the case. When we returned to Durham, I stayed up all night reading the papers.. In the morning, I said to my wife that I was 90 % plus certain that nothing happened.

I needed a source to rely on in interpreting events and analyzing the issues and developments. That was you. I am extremely grateful for the efforts that you put into covering the case. Your work was first class, you never tired and all right thinking people appreciate your accomplishments.

Well if the anonymous person asking it ______ is a communist has been ID'd I guess the blog can be closed. Kudos for the work you did, KC, every step of the way. If you'd done nothing else in life but this blog, which I know is far from true, this would identify you as a person of great integrity.

"As of today, Durham is no longer in Wonderland. I owe deep gratitude to KC Johnson who for almost a decade was a key part of the intellectual vanguard that gave hope to me and many fellow Duke students/alumni in the face of the University's response to the rape allegations made against members of the Duke Lacrosse team."

In this day of presumed guilt and lack of due process in campus prosecutions, it is essential that there be a strong, steady voice in support of the crucial standards and procedures that must be applied to determine guilt or innocence, and to render justice. You have provided that voice in this case, and we are all very much in your debt. Well done!

Thanks from another parent who has had children in college as this case progressed. Fortunately, they were girls but the abuses in education affect them, if not in the threatening manner that they affect boys. My sons escaped the worst of this as they were in college 30 years ago. My grandchildren, one of whom is a boy, are at risk and maybe you helped to prevent the worst of these abuses in the future.

Dear Professor Johnson: If you don't mind,I think you have one more job to do: making sure a reputable organization, say the Hoover Institution, has a copy of this blog, and of your unpublished working notes. This should be available for future study. It should also have a guardian, ready to defend its existence from the Ministers of Truth at Duke and other such frauds who would gladly see it destroyed so they could claim nothing ever happened.

These days, the mantra of the press is that journalists should "make a difference." They had a chance to do so in the lacrosse case, and generally failed. You didn't. You made a difference in a way that such quacks as Eugene Robinson or New England Law School Wendy, didn't and couldn't.

Yeah, I am going to miss this place, but given the popularity of communism in this country, we will need more of these blogs, rather than fewer, but given that you are part of the problem, it's probably just as well that you are quitting.

We know that KC Johnson's work helped the Duke fake rape case unravel and called us back to values violated by the Duke 88, Duke administrators, the prosecuting attorney and other aider and abettors in Durham. It did much to restore the reputations of the innocent. Continuing as it did for 8 years, this blog and Johnson's contributions elsewhere prepared us to fight Cohan's re-write of known facts. Contributors here also helped just by being themselves: by standing for truth and justice against equivocators who would have us believe principles, values, laws are just for show and the truth doesn't matter much if it gets in the way of predator's goals. So, thanks to all contributors here. You've made a difference. As long as there are people like you I feel confident, all shall be well.

When I ask anyone their views on the Duke lacrosse case, they 'get it'. They know what it means to be Nifonged, they disapprove of the betrayals by Duke professors and administrations, the students are innocent and deserve our support. The evidence supports the conclusion that some of the so-called great universities' leadership and teachers are susceptible to corruption and betrayals of purpose. We have evidence of that, for example, in the support for Brodhead and the hiring of Group of 88 professor/perpetrators. But there are good guys in every system, some more than others. They are the ones who push back.

In sum, thanks to KC Johnson, co-author Stuart, and contributors here, for making our world better.

Except it leaves NC citizens and visitors in even more of precarious position due to the ignoring and blocking of other serious issues in the Duke driven justice system that can have a detrimental effect on any and all, including himself and all other esteemed commentors to this site, that KC choose to 'delete' from the reality he puts forth on his blog. What harm that might cause in the future to innocents is yet to be fully seen. It's not like the dragon and the devil are dead, or anythang. In fact, one might assume that they are even more pissed.

Anonymous 5:34-----from what I've read, there is always this type of aftermath to an historical event when good has triumphed over evil. There is always future harm to innocents. There is always support for old, bad ways long after the evil has been exposed. I've come to accept this as part of the human condition. I ask you, does it matter that some battles were fought and won by the righteous? I think it does. I'm sorry for what Durham is left to suffer from small and possibly corrupt minds, but in my opinion, this is the way of the world. The way things played out there, the response from ethic's boards, the truths that emerged, the issues that were exposed, are part of the public's consciousness, this awareness makes us better able to respond to future evidence of wrong-doing. What's left there is in my opinion among the facts of life. Some people never change their views or alter their way of doing things---even as many of the rest of us move forward, and even as underlying bedrocks of professions and institutions are preserved----because of the acts of the righteous.

We aught ask no more from the righteous, in my opinion.

I wish you the best and hope you can appreciate past what is immediately before you.

Maria that pious bs wouldn't hold a ounce of reassurance and absolution from the quilt of letting others suffer even more because those whom now see the evil and harm and do nothing to stop further harm enables and empowers the 'evil doers' to harm even more, including you and yours and all other innocents. What does it say in history about that?

History says there are fools everywhere who tear at the best they've got for not doing even more...though what the best has done far surpasses the contributions made by almost anyone else.

Woe are the leaders/contributors who depends on others for accolades. He/she will never have done enough. Some will always want more and complain when they don't get it....as if their expectations were reasonable, their wants do-able. Wishing is reasonable, expecting is disrespectful.

Why would you assume that individuals who contribute magnificently in one way are suited to contributing magnificently in a completely different way---because you want them to?

With any upheaval there are aftermaths that have to be dealt with. The upheavals have to happen. The people who facilitate change may not be positioned or have the aptitude to deal with fallouts that aren't central to their effort. They did what they do best, better than anyone else. They likely will not be best suited to do something completely different, especially if it would undermine what they set out to accomplish and it is clear society has benefited from their accomplishment.

I would not have pestered Michelangelo to turn out art like Picasso (or my Uncle Fred...). Michelangelo did what was in him to do, and it was magnificent. A book and a blog like this are works of art and scholarship...unlike any other.

Thanks for your excellent coverage. You stopped a steamroller with the truth. In this day and age that's a tall order. You risked your academic career in doing so. Silence is the easy way out. You spoke out. And you won.

I am a former Duke scholarship athlete whose faith in Duke was shaken to the core by the lacrosse incident. Then again, I attended Duke when Terry Sanford and Ken Pye were in charge, and well, no matter whether one agreed with them, they instinctively knew that taking care of the welfare of young people was an integral part of the job. This is not the case any longer at Duke. Professor Johnson, a heartfelt thanks for paying homage to the truth.

One thing I often find to be the case is that bright people such as Professor Johnson who "own" the facts and care about detail end up "more right" on issues than anyone could have guessed. Take, by way of example, Crystal Gail Mangum. The police knew from the get-go she was trouble, a serial fabricator with a felony record. The community knew she was trouble, too. But she was a caused who needed enabling, not a troubled person who needed boundaries and the criminal justice system. But now she sits in prison, a convicted murderer, allowed to spin for years like an out of control amoeba. This was the person the Group of 88 and legions of other apparatchiks lionized? Could they have chosen any worse?

Ditto for Nifong. As awful as his conduct was in the lacrosse case, well, now comes along the Darryl Howard decision. Could Professor Johnson been any more "right" about Nifong? Could William D. Cohan be anymore "wrong"? As as aside, it always bothered me that Nifong, a prosecutor in a town with many intelligent academics, well, isn't very bright, and coupled with a flawed ethical core, well,he reflects so badly on Durham it cannot be described.

The sad thing is that the Group of 88, the legions of enabling apparatchiks, and Durham won't learn from these incidents. The narrative is more important to them than the facts. I am grateful to people at Duke for what they did for me; I don't however, think are nearly as many principled and productive people at the school as there were in my day. Duke should hire Professor Johnson in a nano-second.

Dick Brodhead was in seminars with me freshman year at Yale. It was clear that he was hard working, organized and talented, but he seem self-absorbed and never contributed to the common discussion. I'm sorry he never learned integrity and humility from the great works of we read together.

Make no mistake, we live in a time when anyone can be indicted and imprisoned if a prosecutor is so minded. We have created a machine of such power, and so little accountability, that King George himself might wonder why we ever bothered to rebel.

Just this month the Innocence Project, on the back of the exoneration of Darryl Howard, has called for a complete legal audit of all of corrupt former DA Mike Nifong's convictions.

The current Durham DA has - hold your breath - objected to the idea of an audit. [many of us expect such an audit could not ultimately be limited solely to Nifong - this is, after all, Durham in Wonderland]

So, the war for justice in Durham continues. A new and glorious battle is joined. The armies are choosing their positions, and marshaling their resources.

There is no single research resource on this planet more useful in this new battle than DIW. Within the yellowed pages of the archive are facts, analysis, and reporting which exist nowhere else:

We find there DA's Michael Nifong and Tracey Cline and others; the culture of injustice; the police participation; the politicians; the indifference of those who should be paying attention; the players.

A remarkable corpus of both reporting, and history. Probably irreplaceable.

Just some random thoughts, KC, from someone who admires you and what you have accomplished.

KC, I only wish there were a mechanism by which I could produce a standing ovation in these comments. This is the best I can do, but if we can imagine that you are the professor and we are the students, I think this fits what you have done these past seven-plus years:

Thank you, thank you, thank you. As another parent of a male collegiate athlete at a North Carolina college at the time of the hoax, I had nightmares time and again that what befell RCD could so easily have happened to my son and his teammates.Your efforts along with those other journalists "on the fly", JinC,Liestoppers, and the inimitable Duke Fact Checker determined that truth rather than a politically correct narrative would triumph. However, there were many months where those efforts seemed almost hopeless - yet you led the charge and provided the impetus for others to do, each in their small way, a way to destroy the gender/race prism through which many sought to view this case.

Like others, I am sad to see this blog come to an end but will bookmark Minding the Campus where I look forward to your trenchant comments on the issues that affect the groves of academe.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. As another parent of a male collegiate athlete at a North Carolina college at the time of the hoax, I had nightmares time and again that what befell RCD could so easily have happened to my son and his teammates.Your efforts along with those other journalists "on the fly", JinC,Liestoppers, and the inimitable Duke Fact Checker determined that truth rather than a politically correct narrative would triumph. However, there were many months where those efforts seemed almost hopeless - yet you led the charge and provided the impetus for others to do, each in their small way, a way to destroy the gender/race prism through which many sought to view this case.

Like others, I am sad to see this blog come to an end but will bookmark Minding the Campus where I look forward to your trenchant comments on the issues that affect the groves of academe.

KC, your dogged work has proven that facts can indeed triumph over lies, when they are carefully researched and clearly (repeatedly) presented. I am deeply grateful to you for your excellent work in pursuit of the truth, and I wish you well in whatever you turn your hand to do.

KC, thank you so much for your Herculean efforts in running this blog. I've lurked from the beginning, fascinated with your insightful analysis. I bought your book and am looking forward to reading it. Again, thank you so much!

I still remember sitting on my front porch reading the N&O's inflammatory Sunday article that initially broke the story. I told my wife that morning that I thought the whole thing was a fabrication, because I refused to believe that the quality of the young men on the team would be so low as to allow the alleged rapes to take place. It seemed obvious that the reporter believed something happened. Thanks, KC, for being a force for truth and good with your blog. The thing that appalls me now is that Brodhead was not fired along with other key administrators/professors. Coach K, for being the "Leadership guru" showed no leadership in this sordid affair, and my opinion of him dropped. Since he has been the de facto face of Duke, he could have slowed the rush to judgement if he had stood up. Cowardly.Thanks again, KC, great work on your part.

Coach K's leadership guruness just got a black man tased reportedly four times after the cops had the man down and hands ready for cuffing. Seems only Coach K is allowed to curse in public in NC without the threat of murder by cop, since the only thing the guy was doing was cursing on a public street in a crowd of other cursing people. Good ol' politically correct NC.

I wonder what caused more of a public disturbance, the man cursing in a crowd of other cursing people, or the cops who penned him to the ground and then tased him repeatedly because they think they can. What do you think Coach K would say about that?

Reading this blog has been one of my great pleasures this year. I read also all the relevant books, including Cohan's of course, and the thoughtful approach and commitment of the blogger and the commentators was a great inspiration to me.

The sad fact is that while you can sometimes prove that "something happened" it's much harder to prove that "nothing happened." So when various forces are aligned innocent people can suffer terribly.

Anyway, thanks for all your work on this project. I'm in NY. Come and visit.

Thanks to 10:18 PM (7/27/14) for the link to the list of Duke LAX malefactors. I had not seen it, and it clarified the roles of some of the "names" and brought out a couple that somehow I had missed.

As for # 1 on the list, I have often wondered how Ms. Levicy escaped any kind of punishment from the courts. The most distressing thing regarding the list is that most of these people still have their well-paying jobs, and, in some instances, better ones.

And thanks again for the umpteenth time to Professor Johnson along with Stuart Taylor and the many commenters of the Durham-in-Wonderland blog.

88 pennies? Sounds like an excellent idea. We aren't Duke alum but what happened at Duke hit close enough to home (we have GWU alum)...that we will send 88 pennies anyway. I suppose we could roll them around in dirt to make our point.

I followed this case from the beginning mostly via the Liestoppers blogs. After a time I added this blog to my favorites and it was my first internet visit of the day for many years even after your updates became infrequent. I still cannot bring myself to remove it as a favorite. I want to thank you. Thank you for all that you have done.

Wonder how the new budget director for NC who is replacing Art Pope and who is the current President of the Duke Alumni Association will express his opinions about the 88 dirty penny alumni donation idea?

I took that day off from work, April 11, 2007, because I did not want to break down and cry in front of my patients - which I knew would happen - when the Lax guys were vindicated.I paid this story little attention at first. My only connection to Duke was that I had deliberately chosen to rotate thru UNC Chapel Hill instead because it was a public institution for non-rich folk.But when Nifong actively avoided learning the facts about this case; especially, refusing to hear RSs story and following up on CGMs cell phone, I was all-in. I could not help myself.Thanks, KC.

You said when you first read the Group of 88 statement, you considered it a terrible betrayal by those faculty members of their students. I suspect the Group of 88 would never consider it a betrayal of any kind since they apparently never thought of white male students as "their" students anyway.

Late to the party, but would like to check in with the observation that by this blog, KC Johnson has demonstrated what the gold standard of a university professor is. Simply by rigorous inquiry, analysis and exposition, he has instructed us all, and serves as a strong model of how an educated human should behave.

It's rather frightening that so many other professors, including and beyond the Group of 88, appear devoted to an Orwellian negation of said gold standard.

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About Me

I am from Higgins Beach, in Scarborough, Maine, six miles south of Portland. After spending five years as track announcer at Scarborough Downs, I left to study fulltime in graduate school, where my advisor was Akira Iriye. I have a B.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard, and an M.A. from the University of Chicago. At Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate Center, I teach classes in 20th century US political, constitutional, and diplomatic history; in 2007-8, I was Fulbright Distinguished Chair for the Humanities at Tel Aviv University.

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"From the Scottsboro Boys to Clarence Gideon, some of the most memorable legal narratives have been tales of the wrongly accused. Now “Until Proven Innocent,” a new book about the false allegations of rape against three Duke lacrosse players, can join these galvanizing cautionary tales . . , Taylor and Johnson have made a gripping contribution to the literature of the wrongly accused. They remind us of the importance of constitutional checks on prosecutorial abuse. And they emphasize the lesson that Duke callously advised its own students to ignore: if you’re unjustly suspected of any crime, immediately call the best lawyer you can afford."--Jeffrey Rosen, New York Times Book Review